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In 1938 the British Government Code and Cypher School (GC&CS) acquired Bletchley Park, Buckinghamshire (in present-day Milton Keynes) as its headquarters. On the outbreak of war it recruited a number of top-level academics – particularly mathematicians and linguists, but also historians, chess champions, and crossword addicts – to work on decrypting German radio intelligence signals picked up by intercept stations (see Y-service). The German signals were encoded using the highly sophisticated Enigma and Lorenz encrypting machines, amongst others, which produced coded messages that the Germans regarded as unbreakable.

Thanks to incredibly brilliant decrypting work by the Bletchley Park cryptologists, coupled with the development of electro-mechanical computing machines, the Enigma (and later, even more sophisticated systems) was broken. As a result, the Allied High Command was informed of German plans and dispositions, often within a few hours of their radio transmission.

Many women worked at Bletchley Park, some as cryptologists but several more providing various support services. In particular there were many hundreds of Wrens (WRNS – Women’s Royal Naval Service) who assisted in the operation of the decrypting machines. A few Wren officers also served as decrypting officers in the troopships converted from the fast peacetime passenger liners whose speed enabled them to cross the oceans unescorted. If Bletchley Park decrypts suggested U-boats might be approaching, signals were sent instructing them to change course.